


The Things We Take for Granted

by nohbodyknows



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/F, F/M, Humanstuck, Irony, M/M, Sadstuck, Zombiestuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-08
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-05-12 16:33:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5672767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nohbodyknows/pseuds/nohbodyknows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat and Dave begin their days so typical, wake up, go to school, get pestered by friends, go home, wash, rinse and repeat. But after a bus ride gone wrong they starts to realize that none of that matters anymore. </p><p>(This is actually a rewrite of one of my previous works The End to Simplicity. If you would like to you can check it out)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Karkat

“Hey, hey, hey Karkat. Karkat. Karkat.” 

You turn around in the bus seat. “I swear poke me one more time, Terezi, and I will come back there and hit you so hard you’ll be able to see again.”

As usual, your threat is ignored. “I was just gonna ask if you’re taking anyone to the homecoming dance yet? Or are you gonna be slower and stay home again like last year?” She smirks. 

You glare at her “You didn't ask anyone to dance last year either you fucking hypocrite. And you and Vriska bailed halfway through to go to IHOP”

“Don't evade the question. “

“If you're gonna be so pushy then fine, yes, I am planning on asking someone out.”

She makes this weird high pitch squeal that makes your eardrums pound. “Tell me who! Tell me tell me tell me!” She's shaking you by your shirt. 

“Bro, you didn't tell me you were interested in anybody.” Dave looks at you from the neighboring seat. “We’re best buds you're supposed to tell me this kind of shit.”

“Well maybe I-” 

The bus screeches to halt, smashing your unsuspecting head against the front of the seat. 

“Ow,” you rub your forehead, more out of annoyance than actual pain, “the fuck as that for?”

Dave stands up. “There's some crackhead or something in the road. He's just kinda standing there”

You try to stand up on your seat to get a better view but the bus driver yells at everyone to sit down. The driver honks at the man in the road. Obviously that doesn't work since you’re still not moving. 

“Everyone stay seated. I'm going to go out there and see if I can get him to move.” The driver exits the bus and, of course, everyone moves out of their seats to the front of the bus. Terezi manages to elbow through kids all the way up to the front window. You and Dave stay behind, you standing on a seat to see. 

the bus driver is walking towards the man, who you can now see clearly. he didn't look like your average run of the mill druggie. something's… off about him. the way he moves is wrong. the bus driver grabs the man's arm to lead him off the road, and that's the moment when shit hits the fan. the man leans forward and bites a large chunk off the driver's arm. everyone on the bus screams. The man drops the driver and starts running across the street away from the bus. 

“We gotta get outta here” Dave grabs your hoodie and tries to drag you off the bus.

“where are we gonna go? We're not even close to home,” you argue. 

“John lives near here. We can just go to his house.”

“Fine.” You don’t really like hanging out with that buck-toothed asshole, but right now it seems you have no choice. “Where did Terezi go? We can't just leave without her” You look around, but she's nowhere in sight.

“She'll be fine. She's all kinds of tough, now come on.” 

The two of you push your way through the crowd and leave the bus. The streets are chaos. People who had stopped to flee from the man left their cars in the road, stopping the entire street. In the distance you think you see more of those things coming towards you. You and Dave take to the side of the street hoping to avoid the flurry of frantic people and cars. 

After five minutes of running you finally reach John’s neighborhood. All the houses look exactly the same, the only difference in John’s being the large tree with a tire swing in his front yard. As dave goes to knock on the door the two of you hear a scream. 

“Fuck, was that John?” you panic. 

Dave tries opening the door but it's locked. “Dammit, let's try the back.” 

You run to the back of the house and look in the glass door. Inside you see John cowering from something you can't see. You pound on the door and get his attention. He looks over at you, his face a mix of fear and relief. He takes one more look at whatever was behind the wall and scuttled over to you. He swings the door open and runs out of the house. 

“John what's in there?” Dave grabs his shoulders, trying to calm him down. 

“I- I don’t- it's -” As he tries to explain you notice something moving toward the glass. Suddenly you know why John was so terrified. It was his dad, but he looked as bloody and wrong as the man that attacked your bus driver. 

“Let's get out of here, guys” you try to push the two of your friends out of yard. John looks over at his dad and let's out a sob. Dave helps you pull him away from the door and out of the yard. You stop once you reach a park at the middle of the neighborhood. John takes a seat on a bench with his head in his hands. 

“This has to be a nightmare there’s no way this is real.” he mutters. 

You and dave stay quiet, not knowing what to say. There's no book on how to help your friend after his dad became a flesh eating monster. You start to worry about your own family. Your mom and your dad and your brother. You'll be honest they annoy the shit out of you, but still you can't imagine them becoming one those, things. You should call and check on them. You reach in your pockets for your phone, only to realize it's on the bus along with your backpack. 

“Shit” 

“What's wrong” Dave asks. 

“I left my phone on the bus like fucking dumbass.”

“Here you can borrow mine, do you know anyone’s number?” 

“Who the fuck memorizes phone numbers anymore, Dave?”

“I was just asking, calm down. I'll call my bro”

Dave’s brother answers after a long wait filled with tense ringing. You only hear one side of the conversation. 

“Hey Bro, me, Karkat and John are the park in John’s neighborhood and there's cannibals roaming the streets can you pick us up?” 

“Because our driver got his face eaten off just come down here and pick us up”

While Dave argues with his brother you sit down on the park bench next to John. He's calmed down in the past few minutes and is now just staring down at the ground.

“I was such an asshole to him, Karkat.”

“What?”

“To my Dad. I can't stop thinking of all those times when he wanted to spend time with me and I just pushed him away. He always wanted to bake a cake with me or teach me a few new songs on the piano and what did I do? I just hid in my room watching shitty movies and ignoring him. This morning he offered a ride to school and of course I said ‘no I'll just walk there it's only a block’. I- I just want to tell him that I love him.” 

“Damnit!” Dave throws his phone against the mulch. “That stubborn jackass said figure it out yourself. Fuck!”

“You know, the school is close by, we could just head back there,” you suggest. 

Dave sighs. “Yeah I guess you’re right. If gets real bad we could hole up in one of the classrooms or something” 

“And there's a ton of food in the lunchrooms, just in case” John adds. 

“Then it's settled. Let's hurry up before it gets too dark. 


	2. Dave

When you get the school you realize everyone else had the same idea as you three. You go inside and find the cafeteria packed with student and teachers. you see Terezi and Vriska running towards you. 

“You're okay! Where were you?” Terezi pulls you in a bone crushing hug. Out of the corner of your eye you see Karkat grimace. You pry Terezi’s bony arms off of you. 

“Well after you totally bailed on us we decided to go to John’s house.” 

“So that's why this nerd’s here huh?” Terezi pulls one of her trademark smirks. 

“Let's not talk shit about each other for five minutes and focus on the problem at hand. “ Karkat steps in. 

“He's right,” you agree. “Let's find somewhere here to hole up before all the good spots get taken. this whole thing will probably blow per after a few days.” 

“I think the language classrooms would be a good place to stay,” Vriska suggests. “It's on the top floor, surrounded by concrete and there's a shit ton of food still left over from culture day still.”

“Then let’s hurry up.” Terezi says. “Everyone here is starting to get either really scared or really pissed off.” 

The four of you make your way up to the language hallway. To avoid the teachers attempting to get everyone in order you decide to take the back stairs. And that’s where things get awkward. Sitting on the stairs, smoking his favorite pastime, is Gamzee Makara. Of all people to be chilling on the stairs it had to be the kid with a rocky past with everyone. 

“Well hey, if it isn't my favorite motherfucking bros in the whole world. What's up my best friends?” 

You can tell Terezi is about to lose her shit. It's times like this you're glad Vriska's around.

“Look Makara, we'd love to stay and chat and reopen old wounds, but we should get going, you know how it with the zombie apocalypse and all.” She tries to shoo everyone upstairs but Gamzee stands and blocks the way. 

“Now what's the big rush all about. I find that's it's no coincidence all my bros are here at once and I think now is a perfect motherfuckin opportunity for a nice recap on old times. “

“By old times do you mean when you treated us all like shit?” Terezi snaps. 

“Guys does any of this really matter right now?” Karkat steps between the two. “I think we have much bigger problems to deal with right now. People are dying and you guys are freaking out over something that happened two years ago?”

“What's all this about people dying?” Gamzee asks. 

“Did you not hear about the people going all cannibalistic on each other?” You take a look outside the back doors. There's people crowding the parking lot, way more than when you first got here. “Shit there's a lot of them. Let's hurry up and get upstairs. You with us or not?”

Terezi looks at you like you’re insane for even offering him to stay with you guys. Lucky for her, he declines. 

“Naw, I'm just gonna chill here and finish this off.” He flourishes his cigarette. “This town has seen worse, I'm sure we're all gonna be motherfuckin perfect.”

“Alright suit yourself, we're outta here.” Vriska and Terezi dash up the stairs and you, Karkat, and John follow close behind. 

 

The world language hallway is empty which is great news for the five of you. you decide to hole up in the German room, it's the biggest and had no windows for things to break through. you start hauling stuff from all the other rooms inside

As you were raiding the French room for some leftover baguettes your phone rings. It's your sister rose in New York. 

“Dave, are you alright?” She's never once said hello when she called you

“Yeah I'm fine, I'm assuming you’re calling cause of the whole zombie invasion thing?”

“They're not zombies, don't be childish. They're infected with a pathogen from a lab accident that happened in Washington“

“You seem awful knowledged on the subject. Did you happen to have something to do with this?”

“No, Mom heard about experiments on criminals going on in Washington and got interested in the subject, but she realized that the people running the experiments were doing so improperly and without necessary containment procedures. She tried to shut down the project.”

“Is there any way you can give me the short version of this story?”

Rose sighs “There was a gene they found that caused violent tendencies in criminals, instead of isolating and destroying the gene, the scientist in Washington accidentally enhanced it. The subject got loose and infected a bunch of other people with the gene and that's what's causing this”

“How does someone fuck up science so badly they cause the zombie apocalypse?”

“Blame Dr. Harley”

“Oh shit I know a Harley, that's John's cousin. Do you think they're related?” 

“It's a possibility, but the reason I called is because Mom thinks she's found a cure.”

“Damn, that was fast.”

“She's been in her lab since this whole thing started, she thinks she has it but I'm not so sure. I'm worried about her Dave. I've never seen her this bad.”

“Is she-”

“Yes, half the cabinet is gone and I think she has some stashed away in her lab somewhere.”

Before you can express your worry for your mom someone shouts your name

“Dave!” Karkat's running toward you from the other end of the room. he pushes you to the floor as you see the French teacher reach out for you. well, what used to be the French teacher. Now she has a frenzied look in her white eyes and and a huge chunk missing from her arm. She missed you but grabs Karkat instead. He tried to squirm away from her grip but to no avail. You reach for a yardstick and smack it over Mrs. Delour’s head. It breaks but does it's job and she falls to the floor.

“Thanks man,” you pick Karkat up off the floor.

“You're the one who saved me from her.”

You pick up your phone, only to find it split in two pieces. You weren't expecting your shitty flip phone to last you that long but still, the least it could've done was let you finish your conversation. 

“Who were you talking to?” Karkat asks.

“Rose.” You tell Karkat about how this whole thing started and how your mom is back on the booze wagon. 

“I thought she was done with that stuff.”

“Well the end of the world is pretty stressful. I want to go out there, to see if she's okay.” 

“Dave, we’re in Texas. How the hell are we gonna get to New York? “

“I have that moped I got for my birthday a few years ago. “

“Are you insane? The trip is over 1000 miles you really think your shitty scooter is gonna get us there safely?”

“Us?” 

“Yes, us. I'm not letting you travel cross country alone unsupervised. If it weren't for me you'd be dead right now in case you forgot.”

You laugh. “Alright. Then we should go see of anyone else is coming then head on out to my place.”

You and Karkat walk into the German room. You throw the bread you found onto the large stockpile in the middle of the room.

“Hey who's up for a road trip?” you announce. 

“What's the big rush to leave us, Dave?” Vriska asks. “Is this place not big enough for your enormous ego?” 

“Well that, and I'm heading up to New York to see my sister.” 

“I'll go with you guys” John says. it's better than staying here with this abomination.” He gestures to Terezi, who sticks her tongue out at him. 

“Well if that doofus is going then I have to go, he's not getting away from me that easily.”

“I'll go too, someone has to prevent you guys from getting lost” Vriska says. 

“Great, there's just one problem, I've got no ride for all of you.”

“If we stop by my place there’s have a van we can use.” Karkat suggests. 

“Perfect. We’ll go cross country in Karkat's mom-mobile. “

“Maybe not right now, it's really dark out. I don't think it's safe.” John points out. 

“Good point, we’ll stay here tonight and leave first thing tomorrow morning.” 

The five if you sit around your stockpile and enjoy a small dinner of cold German sausage and bread. About halfway through your meal the power goes out. It starts to dawn on you that this is serious. You are living in a world so much different from yesterday, and get the sneaking suspicion that it won't ever be the same. 


	3. Karkat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IM BACK

You wake to total darkness. You forgot about the power outage last night. In the hallway you see a strip of light coming in from a window. You should be leaving soon if you want to make it to your house.

“Karkat, you up?” Dave whispers.

“Yeah,” you answer.

He looks down at his watch. “We should get going, it's already eight.”

“Alright, let's get everyone up.” You walk around the room, shaking your friends awake while Dave starts shoving stuff in bags. Once they're all up you’re ready to go. Almost.

“Wait,” John says, “We don't know what we're dealing with out there. What if there's just a massive horde or something is sitting out there?”

Terezi laughs, “I got us covered.” She holds up her cane and removes the bottom, revealing a hidden blade inside.

“What the hell Terezi?” You yell. “How long have you had this?”

“My sister made it for me. Cool huh? Now wittle Johnny doesn't have to be scared anymore,” she mocks.

“Shut up.” John was never good at comebacks.

“She does have the right idea though,” Vriska admits. “We’re gonna need stuff to defend ourselves with.”

“Alright, let's all go around the rooms and see what we can find,” you order.

Five minutes later you're assembled again, each of you holding a piss-poor excuse for a weapon. John has a small hammer, Vriska managed to rip the leg off a chair, Dave rigged up a yardstick riddled with pushpins, and you take the metaphorical cake with a pair of kiddie scissors.

“Let's do this.” Your voice shakes more than you want it to as you head down the hall toward the back stair case. The plan is to leave out the back doors, and run until you hit your neighborhood. In theory this seemed like a good plan of action, until you got a looks outside.

The number of people doubled from yesterday, filling up the parking lot and blocking the exit.

“Maybe we should try the front door?” John suggests. But it seems the commons area is just as packed with people as outside.

Your options are limited. You look around you, trying to find something, anything that can get you out of this. Then you have a stupidly brilliant idea.

“Alright, you guys stay right here, I'm gonna sneak around them and climb up onto one of the buses. I'll make a ton of noise and draw them away so you can make a run for it over the fence.”

“I see many flaws in this plan,” Dave says. “One, how the hell are you gonna climb onto a bus Shortstack. Two, after we get across the parking lot, how are you gonna get to to us?”

“I have a plan for that,” you lie, “trust me.”

Dave looks at you with, worry? Disbelief? His emotions are hard to discern. “Does anyone else have an it idea?”

No one speaks up.

“I guess Plan Use Karkat as Bait is our only hope.” He slaps you on the shoulder. “Go get ‘em tiger.”

You take a deep breath then step outside. The smell hits you first. A mix of vomit left out in the sun and rotting eggs. Covering your nose, you slip towards the bus. Your heart is beating out of your chest. How is this working? How have they not noticed you yet?

You reach the bus and instantly start climbing up the side, using the grooves and the windows as footholds. Your foot slips as you near the top, almost plummeting you to the floor, but you manage to grab hold of the roof and pull yourself up. You balance on the curved roof, trying not to fall.

“Hey Uglies! Over here!”

The parking lot crowd snaps their attention toward you, as does everything else in a mile radius. You really should have thought this through. Mo

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this is such a short chapter, I hope that I'll be able to write longer ones for you guys
> 
> Also critisism is totally welcome, just lay it on me I can take it


End file.
